Challenge No. 45 – Egg Custards

Posted on November 23, 2015 by MyGastroAdventure

I’m starting off with an apology for the lateness with this post. I’ve been having trouble uploading the photos. I’ve finally managed to add the photographs to the blog, although I don’t like the new way of doing it!

This suggestion caused a bit of confusion to start as my friend Laura asked me to make “egg custards”. I’d never heard of these and wondered what on earth she was talking about. This isn’t uncommon in our friendship. I met Laura on my first day at University and had the pleasure of living with her for two years. During this time and in the years of friendship since, Laura and the other University girls have taught me many things. In particular, I’m never allowed to forget the time that had to explain to me what a Wendy House was or the time I didn’t know what an onion bhaji was. Most recently I managed to get confused between crème brûlée and tiramisu and the Laura and one of the other girls have affectionally named our group messenger chat “tiramisu” 🙂 So it was nice to see Laura teaching me something new again in Challenge 52 with her suggestion of “egg custards”.

After a little bit of research, I discovered that what Laura called “egg custards” is what I knew as custard tarts. I found a recipe by Paul Hollywood who actually called them egg custard tarts and so I decided this was the one I had to use this one.

I amended the quantities slightly and for this recipe, you will need the following:-

For the sweet pastry
- 165g/5¾oz plain flour, plus extra for dusting
- 25g/1oz ground almonds
- 120g/4¼oz chilled unsalted butter, cubed
- 55g/2oz caster sugar
- 1 free-range egg
For the custard filling
- 400ml pint full-fat milk
- 4 free-range egg yolks
- 52g caster sugar
- freshly ground nutmeg

Ed - ingredients.jpg

I started off by making the pastry by stirring together the flour and ground almonds. I added the cubed butter and rubbed it together to form breadcrumbs.

Practical tip: warm hands will begin to melt the butter and the mix will become too wet. If, like me, your hands are prone to being warm, run them under a cold tap for a while and dry them thoroughly before you get started. Repeat this cooling process periodically to make sure your hands don’t warm up too much.

Ed - flour and butter.jpg

Despite having used the rubbing technique a number of times over the last year, for some reason the breadcrumbs didn’t form as they should have done this time. I tried keeping my hands cool but it still didn’t work. I don’t know whether the flat was a bit hot or whether I just overworked it but whatever the reason, my butter didn’t rub in very well.

I got to a point where I decided I didn’t want to keep working the mixture as it was starting to become to moist. I tried to stir through the sugar and added the egg. I mixed it with my figures and tried to form a soft dough. The dough was really wet and just didn’t quite seem right. However, I persevered and turned it out onto a floured surface to work together. I managed to form a ball and popped it the fridge for 30 minutes.

Ed - questionable breadcrumb.jpg

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Once the dough had chilled, I chopped it in half. As there was only me and Dave to eat the results of this challenge, I decided to half the custard filling quantity and just use half the pastry. The plan was to freeze the second half of the pastry, however, as you may have picked up, this challenge didn’t quite go to plan.

I took half the pastry and on a floured surface tried to roll it out so I could cut out 6 circles using an 11cm flutted cutter (as specified by the recipe). There is no way I could get 6 circles out of this dough. It was too fragile to roll out to the necessary size. I decided to just get as many as I could but the dough was too ‘wet’ to lift up and pop in my muffin tin.

After a little bit of a stress, I decided to use my smaller tin and a smaller cutter. In hindsight, this wasn’t the best decision and I should have just persevered with the muffin tin and large cutter. Instead, I ended up with tiny tarts which didn’t really have the filling they needed to constitute a proper egg custard tarts.

Anyway with my pastry in the smaller tin, I got start on the custard. I put the milk into a pan over a medium heat and waited for it to nearly reach a simmer.

I used a balloon whisk to bring together the egg yolks and sugar until pale. I then poured in the warm milk and whisked it together.

I transferred the custard mixture to a pouring jug and tried to carefully pour this into the tarts. DISASTER struck! I managed to spill the mixture all over one side of the tin, ruining at least 4 of the tarts. I was on the verge of giving up, had a little strop and shouted at Dave for trying to help. I then calmed myself down, apologised to Dave and cracked on to see just how badly these would turn out.

Ed - disaster.jpg

I grated some nutmeg on top and popped them in the oven on 180 degrees celsius. I set the timer for 10 minutes to then keep an eye on them.

When the tarts were in the oven, I decided to use the remaining pastry to push into two of the muffin tin holes. There was no way I could roll it out but I thought I’d give this a go. I then filled the pastry with some of the custard mixture and added the tin to the oven.

When the 10 minutes timer went off, I sat in front of the oven and watched until I got a very slight dome on the custard. I don’t really know what this meant and just guessed. I mean, it couldn’t get much worse.

I took the tins out of the oven (at different times as the muffin tin tarts took a lot longer to dome) and left them on the side to cool for 30 minutes. I then removed them from the tin and braved a taste.

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They weren’t as bad as I thought they were going to be but they were far from a success. Dave loves custard tarts and was really looking forward to this challenge. He tried some (before I’d even managed to get my photos – hence the half eaten one below) and said they were okay but didn’t quite taste right.

So not a total failure but definitely not something to write home about. Laura was really disappointed she wasn’t going to get to try her suggestion but after reading this, she’ll probably be glad to have escaped the experience.

Coming up next week, a hopefully less stressful Challenge No. 46 – chicken gravy pie.

Challenge No. 43 – Pumpkin Pie

Posted on November 5, 2015 by MyGastroAdventure

Yep, I know, this post is a whole week late! And do you know what? I’m so frustrated about it as this is one of the few recipes I knew exactly when I wanted to be posted 😦 However, life has unfortunately got in the way of my blog just recently. Anyway, better late than never, this is my attempt at Challenge No. 43 and making pumpkin pie.

This challenge was suggested by one of my oldest friends. Alex and I went to primary school and ballet classes together. My parents and Alex’s parents soon became friends and still often go on holiday together. Alex and I don’t speak very often anymore but I have great memories of our early years together. And thanks to my trigger happy mum, many of those memories have been documented in embarrassing photographs like these…

aVPballetAlexJul99

P.s. sorry to Alex for posting these but I couldn’t resist!

So Alex suggested I have a go at making pumpkin pie. I’ve never had pumpkin pie and it was one of the recipes I was really looking forward to trying. It seemed right to wait until Halloween though (and then I went and missed the planned post date)!

I had a little look online and decided to use this recipe from The Guardian’s Felicity Cloake. Throughout Challenge 52 I have quite often read articles by Felicity and I thought it was about time I tried one of the recipes.

For the recipe you will need the following ingredients:-

For the pastry:
- 170g plain flour
- Pinch of salt
- 100g cold butter
- 2tbsp caster sugar
- 1 egg yolk
For the pie filling:
- 1 small culinary pumpkin or medium butternut squash
- 145g maple syrup
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ¼ tsp ground cloves (or 5 cloves, ground)
- 3 tbsp golden rum (optional)
- 2 large eggs, beaten
- 150ml evaporated milk

The recipe is for a 20cm tart tin. I think my tin is actually larger than this but it worked out fine in the end 🙂

I started by making the pumpkin puree. Part of the reason I used Felicity’s recipe was her useful guide on buying the right pumpkin. I didn’t know the big ones you use to carve aren’t very good for cooking and that there are specialist culinary pumpkins! I was therefore really surprised to find one so easily in my local supermarket. It was a sign that I should use the recipe.

I sharpened my knife before I got started to make sure it was going to cut through the pumpkin with ease. I sliced off the top part of the pumpkin and then inserted the tip of the knife into the middle of the base before pulling down to one side. I inserted the knife back into the middle of the base and pulled down the other side to separate the two halves.

I then used a tablespoon to scoop out all the seeds and flesh. I put the two halves, skin side up, onto a roasting tin with 2 tablespoons of water. I then popped it into the oven on 200 degrees celsius for 35 minutes (checking it after 30).

I left the roasted pumpkin on the tin to cool for 5 minutes before peeling off the skin. Once the flesh had cooled further, I put it in my mini blender until it was nice and smooth. I then put the puree into my fine sieve over a bowl. The recipe says to leave it for at least an hour. I actually made this dish over 2 nights so I left the puree in the sieve until it was time for bed. I then put it in some tupperware in the fridge.

Practical tip: pumpkin puree will keep for approximately a week in an airtight container, stored in the fridge.

So the next night when I was home, I got on with the rest of the recipe. I put the puree back into the sieve as some liquid had gathered in the bottom of the tupperware.

I sieved the flour into a large bowl, added the salt and then grated in the butter. I rubbed the butter into the flour until it resembled breadcrumbs and then stirred through the caster sugar.

Ed - grated butter Ed - breadcrumbs

Practical trip: warm hands will begin to melt the butter and the mix will become too wet. If, like me, your hands are prone to being warm, run them under a cold tap for a while and dry them thoroughly before you get started. Repeat this cooling process periodically to make sure your hands don’t warm up too much.

The next bit of the recipe threw me slightly. It instructs to mix the egg yolk with 2 tablespoons of iced water and then to sprinkle half over the mixture. I therefore whisked the egg yolk in my mini jug, added water which I had in the fridge and then used a tablespoon to put around half into the dry ingredients. I used knife to mix it altogether and added a little bit more liquid until it came together, finishing it by hand.

I then rolled it out onto a floured surface. Unfortunately when I tried to lift the pastry into the tin it kept splitting. So in the end I took the base out of my tin and rolled the pastry directly onto this until it was nearly to the edges; I put this back in the tin and then used my fingers to work the pastry up the sides of the tin. I used my small rolling pin to smooth out the middle as best as possible. I then put it in the fridge to chill for 30 minutes.

I covered the pastry with baking paper and filled the dish with my baking rice before putting it in the oven on 200 degrees celsius for 15 minutes. I then removed the rice and baking paper and returned to the oven for around 8 minutes until it was a light golden brown.

I let the pastry cool slightly whilst I made the filling. To do this I mixed together 250g of the pumpkin puree with the maple syrup, rum and spices. I stirred through the eggs before slowly adding the evaporated milk.

I poured the filling into the blind baked pastry and then popped it in the oven on 180 degrees celsius. I initially set the timer for 30 minutes and then checked it regularly until it was “set, but still slightly wobbly in the centre”. This ended up being about 37 minutes.

Once the timer went off, I removed the pie from the oven and let it cool for around 10 minutes before removing the outer ring. I then placed it on a cooling rack for an hour before trying a slice.

Dave and I have never had pumpkin pie before and we were both a bit sceptical. I was unsure at first but it definitely grew on me. Dave however said “it is perfectly executed and it’s not bad but its also not good”! So I decided to take the rest into work and I bought some cream for people to have. When I had my second slice with some cream, I decided I REALLY liked this! It was different but yummy. And the general verdict from my colleagues was great. Even those who didn’t like the pumpkin filling due to personal taste, said the base was amazing! I have to admit, it was the best shortcrust I’ve made 🙂

Coming up soon, Challenge No. 44 – potato bombs.

Challenge No. 41 – Zebra Cake

Posted on October 15, 2015 by MyGastroAdventure

This challenge was suggested by one of the members of Rochdale Triathlon Swim Club (which I haven’t been to for a few months now!). When I was going, Sarah was always in the fast lane and I’m not quite good enough to move up to that lane. Maybe one day 🙂 Whilst Sarah and I never got to swim together, we often had a good chat before and after the swim sessions. Sarah also loves baking and suggested I make a zebra cake for Challenge 52.

After a quick bit of research, I settled on a recipe by Lorraine Pascale. This uses a little bit of orange zest to flavour the chocolate sponge and I thought it would be delicious – I was right!

For this recipe you’ll need the following:-

250ml sunflower (or other flavourless) oil, plus extra for greasing
250g caster sugar
100ml semi-skimmed milk
4 medium eggs (at room temperature)
A few drops of vanilla extract
300g self-raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
25g cocoa powder
1 orange

The recipe uses a 23cm round cake tin, however, I only had a 20cm one and I just went ahead and used this. I just had to adjust the cooking times slightly as it was a deeper cake than it would have been in the 23cm tin.

I started by lining the base of my tin with baking parchment. I removed the base and used it to trace a circle on the baking parchment. I then brushed the tin and base with some olive oil, pushed in the parchment and then gave it a once over with the already oiled brush.

I then put the oil, sugar, milk, eggs and vanilla extract into a bowl. By the time I had got all the ingredients in, the sugar had started to crystallised, having soaked up the wet ingredients. However, it soon started to break down as I have it a good stir with a wooden spoon. The recipe recommends against using an electric whisk as you don’t want too many air bubbles in the mixture.

Anyway, once the ingredients has mixed together to form a smooth wet liquid, I measured out 400ml into a jug and poured it into another bowl. I wondered whether it needed to be half the mixture but when I measured the remainder there was only 300ml. I therefore took 50ml back from the larger amount so I had 350ml in each bowl. I then reread the recipe and doubted myself so I decided to switch it back to 400ml and 300ml.

I then sifted 175g of self raising flour and 1/2 tsp of baking powder into the 400ml portion. I have it a good mix with the wooden spoon until it was well combined.

I put this mixture to one side and got started on the chocolate one. I sifted 125g of self raiding flour, 1/2 tsp of baking powder and 25g cocoa powder into the bowl with 300ml of mixture. I mixed it all together and then stirred through the orange zest.

Practical tip: zest the orange directly over the bowl to get the best flavour and not lose out on any of the orange goodness!

With the two mixtures ready, I got my pan and four tablespoons. I used two tablespoons for each bowl…one to measure the mixture and one to scoop it off the other. I then put one tablespoon of white mixture into the pan and then added a tablespoon of the chocolate mixture. I kept alternating the mixtures until it was nearly all used and the mixture reached the edges of the tin.

I wasn’t very good at keeping my ‘dollops’ in the centre of the tin and soon enough, I was working more to one side of the tin. When I realised this was happening, I tried to avoid putting the mixture directly in the centre of the last ‘dollop’ and gradually worked it back towards the centre.

Ed - in tin I then put the tin in the oven on 180 degree celsius for 25 minutes. I rotated the tin half way through cooking. After the 25 minutes was up, I reset the timer for another 5 minutes and continued to do so until the cake was cooked. In total I think I cooked the cake for around 48 to 53 minutes (I lost track slightly but I think it was one of these!).

Practical tip: in case you missed my earlier cake challenges, to test whether a cakes is cooked, gently press the top with your finger; if it is done it will be springy to touch and bounce back into place. You can also take a tooth pick (or cake tester if you have one) and slide it into the centre the cake; if the cake is done the tester will come out clean. If unsure, test a few different parts of the cake to make sure its done! If you think it’s not quite done return the cakes to the oven but keep an eye on them – 1 minute may be all they need but that 1 minute can make all the difference!

I left the cake to cool in the tin for 10 minutes and then put it on a cooking rack with the parchment still on the bottom. Once it was cool, I cut a slice for me and Dave to share.

Well, what can I say about this cake…it was gorgeous! It was so moist and full of flavour. The chocolate orange flavour was soooo good and I would encourage everyone to have a go at this cake. Not only does it look pretty and skilful, it tastes amazing.

Even Dave, who isn’t generally the biggest fan of normal sponge cake, went back for a second, larger helping! 🙂

Coming up next week, Challenge No. 42 – Lamb boulangere.

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